As for his OPS at home, I can see your point sort of, but it’s important to remember that the league had a 673 OPS at Petco in ’08. We’re talking about the most extreme pitching environment in baseball.

As to Peavy, the Padres aren’t really seeking a second baseman (although I’m sure they’d make an exception for a certain SoCal product who now plays in Philly ). My understanding is that they’d want a few good young pitchers in any potential deal.

2008: .697 RZR, 10th out of 12 qualified 1B
2007: .722 RZR, 7th out of 12
2006: .809 RZR, 5th out of 13

Looks like his glove has gotten worse with each passing season. I guess that’s not too surprising.

I don’t disagree with you about Gonzalez vs. Petco, but he played half his games there and put up a sub-.800 OPS. Stadium or not, that’s not MVP-caliber stuff. The “Petco holds him back” argument would have weight if we were just comparing players (like Adrian vs. Ryan Howard), but we’re talking about value.

By the way, I’ve been dreaming up some trade scenarios in my head, like the Padres sending Jake Peavy and Adrian Gonzalez to the Phillies for season tickets. I know the Padres are looking for a second baseman, but is there any other position they’re desperate to fill?

1) His OPS is “good, not great” because he plays half his games in the majors’ most difficult hitting environment. In context, his OPS is pretty close to great. Petco Park does a terrific job of disguising Gonzalez’s offensive value. For example, among all big-leaguers with 750 or more road PA since 2006, only seven have a higher road SLG.

2) He does not play bad defense. I’ve been watching Gonzalez very closely for the past 3 years, and all of his relevant defensive skills — hands, footwork, instincts, arm strength, arm accuracy — rate between above average and outstanding.

He is slow, though; I’ll give you that. Boy, is he slow…

“Lou’s only competition here is Charlie Manuel, but his team won 97 games in a tougher division that included another 90-win team in the NL Wild Card-winning Milwaukee Brewers.”

Did you not notice what Tony LaRussa did all season in Saint Louis? He had, arguably, his best season as a manager. He stayed in contention for 7/8 of the season with Pujols and little else. He got the most out of every position possible. Maybe he shouldn’t win, but he’s in the discussion.

Going by VORP, Gonzalez was the third-most-productive first baseman in the NL behind Pujols and Berkman, but he’s only got a .104 PMLVr because he’s an offense-only player at an offense-heavy position. His PMLVr ranks 37th (tied with Jayson Werth) in the NL.

Gonzalez’s season was good, no questions there, but he wasn’t even close to being as valuable (and keep in mind that I am concerned with value in the economic sense, even though we aren’t taking salaries into account) as the five guys I mentioned. An .871 OPS is good, not great, and he has no speed and plays bad defense.

As for Ziegler, he was very good indeed. His ability to induce GBs is out of this world.

Ziegler was fairly lucky this year though. The more often he pitched, the better lefties did against him.

He and Brad Ziegler were easily the two best relief pitchers in baseball this season.

Joey Devine: 45.7 IP, 0.59 ERA (685 ERA+), 0.832 WHIP, 49 K, 15 BB, 0 HR.

Brad Ziegler: 59.7 IP, 1.06 ERA (384 ERA+), 1.156 WHIP, 30 K, 22 BB, 2 HR.

Old — you might be interested in reading this, which is my reasoning as to why Ryan Howard ain’t even close to the NL MVP.

HR and RBI aren’t a good way to evaluate production. RBI are more dependent on having players on base ahead of you (their on-base percentage) and HR aren’t inherently a whole lot more valuable than extra-bases in general (slugging percentage).

Pujols and many others have Howard killed when it comes to OBP and SLG, which are efficient measures of offensive production (as are VORP and PMLVr, which are Sabermetric).